


Tamarix

by Jupistruck



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist, Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-23
Updated: 2014-03-23
Packaged: 2018-01-16 19:24:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1359046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jupistruck/pseuds/Jupistruck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pinako Rockbell finds flowers at Sara and Urey's graves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tamarix

After the end of the Ishbal Rebellion, she regularly visited the graves of her son and his wife, young Winry in tow. They would clear away the wilted flowers, replace them with fresh ones; a handful of zinnias at the base of each headstone. Sara had loved Zinnias, had kept the garden well-tended with them, and Urey would have the florist ship them in from the south when they were out of season, just to make her smile. This particular rain-soaked morning, nearly a year since their bodies had been shipped back home from the front, someone else had come first. Nestled next to the blooms they had picked from the window-box at home lay a pair bouquets, thick with deep-hued hyacinth, yew-flowers, and tamarix.

It had eased her mind, that someone else remembered, still cared enough to leave them for her lost children... or at least it had, until she'd spoken to the local florist, curious to see who had purchased them. Mrs. Garrings didn't carry hyacinth, since it didn't grow well locally, and never carried tamarix, because it grew in the desert, and who would want a such a flower? Mrs. Garrings had frowned, informing her that tamarix were usually given as an apology when someone had done them wrong.

Another year she'd been busy in the kitchen when movement out the window caught her eye. Peering through the curtains, she'd seen him at the base of the porch steps, early spring rain pouring down on him; a handsome young man, or at least he would have been, if not for the smartly cut military uniform and the shuttered expression. She watched as he took a deep breath, one foot on the first stair, before he'd turned away brusquely, retreating out of her line of sight. That evening at the headstones of her children she found two matching bouquets of hyacinth, yew, and tamarix, and she wept openly for them again, for the first time in nearly a year.

The next year brought the return of the brothers Elric, or what remained of them. Edward, bloodied and dismembered. Alphonse a terrified, miserable echo of the boy she remembered.

There was no knock at the door. Surely in the thunderstorm they wouldn't have heard him anyway. But the face of the man who entered her home was one she'd burned into her memory, had wondered if he would re-enter their lives in the form of two bundles of flowers that spoke of grief and mourning and a crime gone unpunished.

There was no sign of grieving in his voice though, face and tone both schooled carefully into businesslike professionalism. Even when he addressed her, placating and cool, his gaze only flickered for a moment. He was far more intent on Alphonse and the boy swathed in bandages in the bed. It was infuriating, made worse when he proffered a letter from Edward as his excuse for being there, years past its postmark. There was no admission on his lips, but even as she pressed him, his eyes flickered over to young Winry who looked so much like her mother, and the hitching of his breath effectively condemned him. She wanted to throttle him, force out of him the missing piece. What had happened to her son and his wife, the parents of her beloved granddaughter? Why he had appeared _yet again_ and ripped open the wound that would never quite heal? Surely he could see in her eyes that she knew?

He disappeared as quickly as he came, leaving with them nothing more than a name and an invitation meant for the boy who still lay on the brink of consciousness and bleeding through his bandages.

She'd prayed that she was wrong, that she was jumping to conclusions, but next morning in the cemetery, sodden from the storm, lay the declaration of his transgression: two matching bouquets of hyacinth, yew, and tamarix.


End file.
